My good buddy Chris Faulkner breaks down how difficult it can be on your equipment doing “run & gun” documentary work. Definitely worth a watch.
CTG: I am officially done discussing when the MPAA will finally begin to change, and am now ready for the conversation about what needs to be done to officially eliminate the MPAA altogether and establish a new, legitimate ratings board and system.
As Kirby Dick exposed so well in his 2006 documentary, This Film is Not Yet Rated, The MPAA is an archaic, rigid and corrupt group of glorified soccer Mom’s who are so blatantly out of touch and ethically bankrupt, that there is little hope for the true artist attempting to get his/her work out to a mass audience. They’re a censorship board masquerading as a pillar to the artistic community.
Now, with a decision like the one outlined in the above article, they are literally preventing a film that promotes positive social change from reaching the exact audience who needs it most. All because of some misguided, ridiculous notion that a film should be rated “R” due to the presence of profanities that today’s youth hear daily in the halls of their schools. This regression as a society has to end. The best place to start is to destroy the disaster that is the MPAA once and for all and create a comprehensive and transparent ratings system.
“This new film is the culmination of years of extraordinary persistence by the documentary filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, whose work freed the three men. So flawed was the evidence against the WM3 that at the end the state decided to avoid a court hearing on their appeal by offering this unique deal: They could go free and could even state their innocence if they would sign an admission of guilt—a technicality shielding Arkansas from lawsuits for wrongful imprisonment.”
- Roger Ebert, from his review of Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory
CTG: Hey, Peter Jackson. Sorry, but Joe Berlinger & Bruce Sinofsky have lived it. What more can you add?
A quick thought on this announcement:
Hey Pete Jackson, great plan. I liked it the first time when Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky did it in 1996, and then again in 2000! Oh and then once more in 2011! Listen, I am of the thought process that there is no such thing as too much media coverage when it comes to stories like this. So if Jackson has something to add, then more power to him. That being said, Joe Berlinger & Bruce Sinofsky have spent the last 15-plus-years fighting the good fight for the West Memphis Three. The films they made truly had an impact on where things stand today. Yet to the average person, no one knows who Berlinger & Sinofsky are. Now Jackson steps forward with an announcement on a documentary, and it’s a big story. Anyone who wants to watch a fantastic documentary on the West Memphis Three need look no further then the Paradise Lost films. They are truly great documentaries and are a must see for anyone with aspirations of being a documentarian.
